Monday, January 11, 2016

As
defending champions (that has such a nice ring to it!) team DAC had high hopes
going into the 12th Farris Cup. The mission at hand was anything but easy -
playing the BAC on their courts - especially since we demolished them last
year. Revenge would be front and center in their minds, and my initial
evaluation of the match-ups had me feeling skeptical that I would be returning
the Farris Cup trophy to our court center cabinet on Monday.

That
skepticism gave way to some hope early in the day. John Rogers’ strength is his retrieval ability. And he is quick.
And he doesn’t stop running. That’s an effective formula at the 2.5 level and
the more he extended the rallies the more he frustrated his opponent, Ryan MacVoy. (Ryan is a member of the
DAC as well, but he was representing the ‘enemy’ on this occasion.) Plenty of
scrambling rallies, the two covered a lot of court as they used the side walls
more than what they no doubt intended, and the longer the exchanges- and match - would drag out, John slowly
gained the ascendancy. He took the match 3-1, and the DAC was on the board
early.

Jason Currie and John Kello

Next
door, Jason Currie was also
exploring deep into the four corners of his court against John Kello. A very even match, both of them were pushing themselves
hard, going back and forth on games. By the end of the third, even though Jason
was 1-2 down and breathing heavily, John looked a little worse off. Jason
needed to keep the pressure on at the start of the fourth game, and try as he might,
John found the strength to keep up and actually was awarded with the
opportunity to win the match at 10-9. And we all thought he did too with a well
played boast into the front backhand corner, but Jason wasn’t having any of it
as he launched himself with a full dive into the shot and managed an incredible
lob that John did very well to retrieve, only to set Jason up for the winner on
the next hit. It was the break Jason needed, and after taking the 4th, he kept
his nose in front for the 5th and took that as well 11-8. The DAC was 2-0 up.

We
would notch another win shortly thereafter from the doubles court. Greg Rivard and Mike Counsman had a dominating start shooting their opponents off
the court and enjoying a 2-0 lead. It unraveled a little for them in the next 2
games and suddenly they found themselves having to battle out a 5th game.
Luckily for them they could get their act back together and they saved their
strong work in games 1 and 2 for the win. The DAC was now 3-0 up and I could
start to believe we may actually pull this off.

Silly
me. It’s what I get for thinking too much... The next 2 results to come in did
not go our way. Mike Rock had to
contend with Rick Claar who was too
experienced. Rick did well reading Mike’s game and as much as he attempted to
make him move, Rick would be ready and know exactly where to place the next
shot. 3-0 Rick. Chris Webber was the
next to go down. He did have his opportunities against Rick Paige, but fitness would be his foe which - as we all know and
have experienced - leads to more unforced errors. It was a close 1-3 score
line, but the BAC had now closed the gap 2 matches to 3.

Our
4th victory was an impressive one. Dane
Fossee did everything right against the solid hitting Britton Steele. Patience, good length, steady. Britton simply did
not have the answers. It was a 3-0 win well deserved and with a 4-2 overall
lead, we could still stay positive.

Ned Mylod and Jed Elley

And
then the BAC pulled out the steamroller and threw us under it. Not that we
weren’t close to winning any more matches, we just... didn’t. Win that is. Josh Slominksi got close. He won the
first and third games and had his opponent, Steve Cosgrove, on the ropes. But Josh struggled to close it out,
and when Steve got on a roll it proved too difficult to stop. It was certainly
a 2-3 loss that Josh let slip, he knew he ‘could’ve’, ‘should’ve’, but full
credit to Steve for putting up with the pressure and keeping the steadier hand.

The
flood gates then opened. A handful of 3-0 and 3-1 losses came in thick and fast
and before we could blink the Farris Cup was lost. Even though we had been
vanquished, a couple of matches still held a lot of interest.

Vikram Chopra was -
in my mind anyway - favorite against Seth
Rogers. It would be however, an arduous chore for Vikram who had just
returned from a 2 week vacation. Seth is no pushover by any stretch, and he is
darn fast. And fit. And Seth always plays like his life depends on it, there
aren’t too many balls that don’t come back. Vikram was under uncomfortable
pressure, and the unforced errors proved it. Seth was relentless with his
pursuit and wore Vikram down to take the merited 3-1 win.

The
other match that raised everyone’s interest was the battle of the Club
Champions. Jed Elley isn’t that old,
but he has a significant age ‘advantage’ over the 16 year old Ned Mylod. Ned is one of the country’s
top juniors in his age group and possesses excellent racquet skills, Jed would
need to be at his best to have a chance. And Jed played well. He moved the ball
around the court effectively, making Ned stretch into the corners deeply. At
times it appeared as if Jed did hit the winner only to see that youthful speed
reach the shot anyway which left Jed flatfooted. Jed’s opportunities came from
Ned’s impatience when he tried to force the winners too early in the rally, but unfortunately he couldn’t keep up the pace and ultimately neither could his
fitness. They were close games, they were entertaining games, but it was a 3-0
win for Ned.

The final score ended up a
little ugly: 13-4. It’s not quite representative of the quality of the
competition on the day, the majority of the match-ups were well balanced. It
wasn’t the DAC’s day. But it was a great atmosphere at the BAC and they are the
most gracious hosts, they fully earned the victory. At least my skepticism
turned out to be correct... which is no consolation whatsoever.